WINNING HEARTS AND MINDS

"I love them because they were the only ones who stood up to the Turkish incursion and defended Kurdistan."
~ Goran Faris.

PKK wins hearts and minds in South Kurdistan, from IWPR:

Abdulla Saeed walks to a makeshift tent a few kilometres from his deserted home. He hums a classic Kurdish song as he follows his donkey down a mountainside in northeast Iraq.

Saeed, 61, is ferrying clothes and other essentials to eight members of his family who fled their home following a Turkish incursion into northern Iraq in pursuit of Kurdistan Workers Party, PKK, rebels in February.

[ . . . ]

There is no official record of the damage that has occurred in northern Iraq as the result of the ongoing conflicts. However, locals say the recent Turkish incursion damaged dozens of villages in the area.

Around 160 families from six villages in Zharawa district near the Qandil mountains fled the fighting and now live in an improvised camp, according to Azad Hasso, the district head.

Mohammad Muhssin, a local Kurdistan Democratic Party, KDP, official, said the fighting also uprooted around 150 families from their villages close to the Turkish border in the Amedi area, northeast of the Iraqi Kurdistan capital of Erbil.

Muhssin said five bridges have been destroyed in Amedi. “People from more than 200 villages used those bridges. Now the roads have been cut,” he said.

Villagers said they faced economic hardship as a result of the clashes.

Hassan Wssu Marf, 59, from the village of Razga in the Qandil range, said he left his home several months ago.

"We can't go back to raise our livestock or to take care of our orchards,” he said. “It’s terrible."

Yet despite the damage and suffering caused to civilians, public support for Kurdish rebels – particularly the PKK – remains high.

“They are Kurds and demand their own rights,” said Saeed. “Neither Iran nor Turkey wants [the fighters] along the Iraqi border because [they] prevent them from destabilising Iraq.”

“I want [the PKK] to be victorious,” said Goran Faris, a 25-year-old secondary school teacher in Sulaimaniyah, the largest city in northeastern Iraq.

“I love them because they were the only ones who stood up to the Turkish incursion and defended Kurdistan.”

Interesting . . . it looks like the Christian jihadis (see the freaks in this video) are lending a helping hand to Turkish Islamists:

War makes strange bed fellows, especially in Turkey, where a dispute over creationism vs Darwinism has created an unusual alliance between the country's Islamists and conservative Christians in the US.

Darwin's Theory of Evolution, in layman's terms, proposes that life descended from organisms through "survival of the fittest." Creationism holds that life was created by an all-knowing being, that is, God.

Creationism advocates from the US traveled to Istanbul May 2007 to meet with their counterparts, seeking to galvanize their link in the fight to bring creationism to schools and universities in their respective countries. The meeting was endorsed by Istanbul mayor Kadir Topbas, a member of the Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP).

[ . . . ]

The May meeting is part of a growing battle for the hearts and minds of Turkey's youth. In fact, conference organizer Mustafa Akyol told ISN Security Watch, in Turkey the creationism-evolution debate is more extensive than it is anywhere in the world.

Akyol is also a member of the Journalists and Writers Foundation, established by Fethullah Gulen, leader of a wealthy Islamic sect that bears his name, the Gulen Movement. Gulen lives in self-imposed exile after fleeing charges of subverting the state, or more specifically, of attempting to "undermine secularism" in Turkey. After long trial, he was acquitted in 2006 but the case has since been reopened, despite the fact that he is said to actually be in the good graces of the current government.

Gulen has an influential network of TV and newspaper interests in Turkey along with close ties to the government. It is rumored he even has the ear of Turkish President Abdullah Gul.

Gülen has far more than just "the ear of . . . Abdullah Gül". The AKP is run by Fethullacı, and the Fethullacı have been pressing for the same kinds of stupidity as their allies, the Christian Jihadis:

The Gulen Movement, along with other creationist advocates, has been lobbying with increasing success for school textbooks to put creationism on equal footing with Darwinism.

[ . . . ]

The involvement of US Christian groups in Turkey in the battle against Darwinism has a long history. In 1985, the Dallas-based Institute of Creation Research collaborated with the then-Turkish government to introduce creationism into the country's school curriculum.

According to Dr Ozgur Genc, a professor at Bosphorus University and a leading opponent of creationism, its introduction was part of a wider state policy called the "Turkish Islamic synthesis."

The country's military rulers at the time, who had seized power in a 1980 coup, wanted to encourage religion to undermine the then-strong support in the country for left-wing ideas.

It's too bad some of the Deep Staters that have been killing Christians in Turkey can't be turned loose against the Christian jihadis. If such were the case, those two groups could fight it out and we might be able to avoid Dark Ages v.2.

From the Liar-Liar-Pants-On-Fire Department:

Come on, now, Condi . . . we know you're lying. Sibel Edmonds called you out on your "outrageous lie" regarding 9/11:

About two weeks before Condoleezza Rice appeared before the 9/11 Commission she made the statement, "We had no specific information." And I told the press that that was an outrageous lie. That was printed on the front page of The Independent [UK] and several other papers here. And what she did during the hearing was very interesting. She corrected herself saying, "Well, I made a mistake. I should not have said 'we.' I should say that I personally did not have specific information." And that is exactly what I stated. "We" includes the FBI, and therefore I can tell you with 100% certainty that that is an outrageous lie.

CYA as White House National Security Advisor; CYA as Secretary of State. If picked up by McCain as a running mate, CYA as VP.